Understandably, the end of the year and the beginning of the next found many of us busy juggling family, work, and life (usually all at once). This was the case for some of our readers involved in December’s Mitchell Mystery Reading Group discussion of 1936’s Dead Men’s Morris. As I am always happy to talk Gladys Mitchell and Mrs. Bradley, I am grateful that mystery writer Catherine Dilts has shared some concluding thoughts about the book! Here are her observations, along with a few of my own, to add to the recent conversation.

NATURE AND NARRATIVE

Looking at Morris’s second section, Catherine writes: “I am accustomed to the witty dialogue in a Mitchell novel, so was pleasantly surprised by detailed description of the countryside.”

The woods were the colour of woodsmoke, and had almost the same dense obscurity; on the opposite side of the road, far off beyond fields and hedges, a line of trees, a thin straggle of windblown trunks and leafless arms, stood up on the crest of a ridge like jagged clouds in the wake of a windblown storm. The sky was grey behind them, and they were silhouetted against it, a scarecrow brood with menace in their very shapelessness.

That is a great example of visual description that certainly sets the tone and reminds us that nature is literally a fundamental element in Mitchell’s prose and storytelling. From the primeval rains and muds of The Devil at Saxon Wall (1935) to the parched, dusty Greek grounds of 1937’s Come Away, Death, this decade definitely shows GM at her most evocative regarding the natural world and Mrs. Bradley’s relationship to it. Her excellent Stephen Hockaby titles of this fertile period display the same exploration of untamable nature, sometimes placid and beautiful but often threatening and destructive to humankind.

Catherine observes that the author’s descriptions of her unique detective carry their own intriguing duality: “Depictions of Mrs. Bradley could still be harsh, but at other times were flattering.”

She looked like an ancient, benevolent goddess, wrinkled but immortal.

“I felt like Mitchell had grown to love her protagonist too much to draw her as a hideous creature. Yet other characters see her as intimidating.” Tombley, for one, is not put at ease by the old woman:

To bring this terrible little old woman into the heart of his affairs was rather like asking a shark to defend one from cannibals.

Catherine notes that “in many cozy mysteries, the victim is unlikable. The author does not want the reader to be emotionally involved with the victim, and gives other compelling reasons why the murder must be solved. Typically, it is to free the wrong suspect from suspicion. In Dead Men’s Morris, the two murder victims are without redeeming qualities.” She offers up this amusing exchange as evidence of Gladys Mitchell’s approach:

[Mrs. Bradley:] “You know, Selby, Fossder was a greedy, grasping, and rather foolish old man, and Simith was a nasty, bad tempered old man. Why should we bother who killed them?”

“Morbid curiosity on your part; a sense of civic duty on mine,” said Sir Selby, grinning.

CLASS AND CONSCIENCE

Regarding the Third Figure and the final section of the book, there is this positive comment: “I was enthralled with the story, to the point that I didn’t slow down to write up notes.” One exchange gave her pause, however. Catherine writes that near the end of the book “there is a startling revelation of the social attitudes of that era that stopped me in my tracks. Carey asks Mrs. Bradley, ‘But how could [the murderer] reconcile with [his/her] conscience the murder of Priest, if that had come off?’ Mrs. Bradley replies, ‘On the principle that to the average European the slaughter of coloured people is not a matter of conscience in the same way that the slaughter of whites would be.’ Carey continues, ‘You mean that just because Priest was poor, and a country man, and uneducated—'”

Catherine concludes, “The manner in which Mitchell presented this conversation made me believe it was her commentary on an unpleasant situation, not approval of the attitude. She seems ahead of her time as an author, but is not in-your-face with her beliefs.” I agree with this interpretation, and also understand the reason for the shock. It’s a moment that directly exposes an ugly Colonialist ideology, and the British Empire is not the only nation whose citizens were quietly (or vocally) complicit in the genocide of indigenous people to promote nationalist expansion.

The parallels between European class consciousness and its corollary of racist contempt in United States history is an interesting and unappealing one. England, with its masters-and-servants divisions and a lack of belief in upward mobility, is historically different from the American view, which has always been predicated on the shakily idealistic premise that one can go from rags to riches if one only worked hard enough. America’s ugly division, historically speaking, is not as much about class as skin color, and who has power over whom, in the past and in the present. Regarding the potential murder of the uneducated laborer Ditch, I believe Mrs. Bradley has a point: the killer can dismiss the act by rationalizing that the death of a menial is not of great concern. Catherine also smartly notes that Mrs. Bradley “distanced herself from that prejudice with the phrasing ‘to the average European the slaughter of coloured people is not a matter of conscience.’ We know Mrs. Bradley is not average.”

THE VERDICT

Catherine’s final thoughts on Dead Men’s Morris below bring joy to my heart, and I look forward to future conversations with her and other group readers as we continue to discuss Gladys Mitchell’s many books!

“The closing explanation of the murder and clues was a bit long, but the convoluted plot required this, in my opinion. And at the end, I wanted to start re-reading the novel. After reading Dead Men’s Morris, I am a confirmed Mrs. Bradley fan.”

I came to Good by Stealth knowing almost nothing of the book's plot or the author who penned it, which is very much my preferred approach. If I can keep away from a summary and let the book surprise me as it goes along, that for me is the ideal journey. (Dedicating a blog to sharing synopses and reviews of these stories so that others can become informed is a bit antithetical, I realize.) When a review copy was offered up by Dean Street Press, which plans to release eBook and print editions of this title and three other Henrietta Clandon crime stories in March, I couldn't resist the chance to sample an author and work that was, to me, an enticingly unknown quantity.

Henrietta Clandon is the nom de plume of Anglo-Irish writer John George Hazlette Vahey, who published many of his crime titles under the name Vernon Loder. Vahey died at the height of the mystery genre's Golden Age of detective fiction, but still delivered an impressive output of more than three dozen books, with the great majority released between 1927 and 1938, the year he died. If 1936's Good by Stealth is a fair indication, Vahey seems to be an author who enjoys subverting genre structures and spotlighting misanthropic characters (traits he shares with accountant-turned-author Richard Hull).

And Good by Stealth may very well be a bit of an outlier within the author's oeuvre, just as it is when compared to its more traditional brethren in the field of detective fiction. Reporting the story in extended flashback, narrator Miss Alice explains her altruistic motives behind sending a score of anonymous poison-pen letters to the residents of Lush Mellish. In doing so, she gets to state her defense to the reader, a process she is convinced was denied her during the official court trial. So we know the crime and the criminal (for Miss Alice would be the culprit awaiting her last-chapter reveal were this a traditionally structured story), and we know the verdict of court and community. What is left, then, is wondering what led up to these acts and whether there was any possible justification. And also just how much sympathy, if any, we should feel for Miss Alice herself.

As a character study, the defiant antihero at the center of this tale is an impressive creation, and Vahey/Clandon imbues Miss Alice with a neat balance of self-pity and obstinacy as she recounts her spiritual battle with the village and its citizens. In her telling, she is the victim, forced to endure the prejudices, caprices, and hypocrisy of her neighbors. Yet even as Miss Alice pleads her innocence to the reader, her actions tell a different story: she campaigns against having the town doyenne's children sing the leads in the annual choral performance; she encourages her bull terrier to terrorize a neighbor's cat; and it is naturally with the purest of motives that she starts to mail unsigned letters to people whom she believes could stand to improve, in morals and behavior. If a marriage engagement is broken or an overemotional girl takes her own life as the result of a well-intentioned letter, that is hardly Miss Alice's fault.

I am curious to know how Good by Stealth will be received by today's classic mystery devotees. While it is a story of crime, there is no propulsive puzzle aspect, except perhaps of the how-will-she-be-caught variety. There are some engaging parries and feints in the book's final third, first as Miss Alice toys with the local police's efforts to track her (which include spying and marked postage stamps), then as her lawyers build up the imagined case for the prosecution so they can start to defend the indefensible. For me, the inverted structure was more admirable than enticing, although the unusual approach to character psychology and the setting of a sleeping village disturbed are both well done. And the concluding sentence delivers a satisfying sting, which is always nice to find.

I mentioned author Richard Hull previously, whose fictional protagonists often bear a grudge against individuals, society, or both. Hull is also at home with telling his tale from the would-be criminal's perspective, as he does in his first and most famous novel, The Murder of My Aunt (1934). One thing I learned from reading comments about Aunt is that some readers may be fine with an amoral murderer, but they are very disturbed to read about violence to domestic animals. While the Hull title has but one unfortunate canine death -- with readers posting that they had to stop reading or wish they had been warned -- Good by Stealth features no fewer than five over the first seven chapters, with dogs dispatched by animal attacks, run over by cars, and general negligence. The deaths are not described explicitly, but even this dog owner got a little restless by the time Miss Alice triumphantly pointed out red marks on tires and stray hairs on fenders. So, readers and S.P.C.A. members, consider this your caveat.

This (hopefully singular) thematic unpleasantness aside, I am intrigued enough by John George Hazlette Vahey's work that I look forward to trying another title: I already have a copy of The Essex Murders (1930), published under his Collins Crime Club pseudonym Vernon Loder, and can't wait to read it. Sincere thanks to Dean Street Press for returning to print four of his Henrietta Clandon books -- hoping that the remaining three HC titles might join the reprint fold -- and for introducing me to yet another "new" author from mystery fiction's Golden Age.

At the center of Love in Amsterdam is a simple and familiar concept: an average man, most likely innocent, is accused of murder. Martin (no last name given, while the judicial bureaucrats appear only by surname) is collected by the police, brought to the station, and detained in connection with the death of Elsa de Charmoy, a former mistress who was found shot four times in her apartment. Martin claims not to have seen the woman for months, but he was sighted on her street on the evening of the killing, with no clear explanation of why he was there. At the station, he is interviewed by a talkative police inspector named Van der Valk, who eventually confides in the suspect that he is willing to presume the man's innocence if he will help him catch Elsa's killer... even if that person turns out to be Martin after all.

The story – rather slim compared with later Piet Van der Valk crime novels – and characters feel very much like products of their time. Published in 1962, Nicolas Freeling demonstrates in Love in Amsterdam that he is more intrigued with realism, psychology, and pathos than with constructing plots and planting clues that give the reader an artificial puzzle to solve. Readers will likely know right away which genre camp they fall into, but I have always had an affinity for both the 1930s-era classic detective mystery and the post-1950s gritty crime tale, provided that each is well-written and has elements to admire. The narrative's third-person focus here remains on Martin, the wronged man at the mercy of an often impersonal criminal justice system. Yet Freeling gives his protagonist an unexpected ally in Van der Valk, and it is clear that this relationship proves the compelling one that the author wants to explore.

Further, the character views and motivations are also of their time, and could understandably sour on a reader when tastes and social norms reflecting attitudes 60 years later are applied. Most problematic in this aspect is the persona of the victim, who comes to life in flashback as an attractive but manipulative man-eater, a woman who leaves her husband and children for Martin and then disposes of him in turn, taking pleasure in the power she wields. Inspector Van der Valk (here and in other stories) does not fail to appreciate the well-shaped leg or firm form of a secretary or housewife, and the detective's intelligent, anchored wife Arlette is not yet on the page in Amsterdam, only referenced, so Martin's clear-eyed and understanding girlfriend Sophia must provide the book with its check against casual chauvinism.

Inspector Van der Valk will quickly become a memorable, likeably unostentatious lead for the series, solidifying fully in the third book, 1963's Gun Before Butter. But in Amsterdam, we are still watching the brushstrokes being applied. In some early scenes, Van der Valk employs a coarseness or jocularity that might be a tactic to get his suspect to drop his guard, but comes off as against type to the introspective detective we know from future stories. The inspector's willingness to sympathize with the accused, however, as well as his penchant for carting Martin over to the crime scene and frankly discussing the case with him, are habits that will remain and expand. Van der Valk's quiet but mischievous contempt for the self-importance and bluster of bureaucratic figureheads within the Dutch justice system is also in place already; this little-cog-in-a-cumbersome-machine perspective is one of the most winning qualities of Freeling's novels.

When it is compared with the other books in the Van der Valk series, Love in Amsterdam suffers a bit. Future stories will filter their characters and crimes through the inspector's humanist point of view, but in this one we see the world from the suspect's perspective. The choice should make the narrative more immediate, with the stakes higher, but it doesn't quite do so. Nicolas Freeling provides Martin with such an equable personality – not very much seems to surprise or trouble him – that it's hard to feel one's own pulse rise in proxy to the situation; we are as distant and removed from the action as the nominal protagonist seems to be.

The book was released in the U.S. the same year as Death in Amsterdam.

The author also pivots to the past in the book's middle section, where we learn about Elsa de Charmoy's personality and her relationship with Martin, but momentum flatlines through this lengthy flashback until we are once more in the present. Freeling excels at creating snapshot moments of Dutch bureaucracy, and these are stylistic high points, from a blustery monologue delivered by a self-important commissioner to a psychologist's maddeningly wearying interview of Martin expressed through phrases and ellipses: "Were you angry… were you glad… did you realize… don't talk, keep your answers brief…" Finally, though, the climax arrives where the woman's killer is identified and hunted; the end scene feels strangely hurried and unsatisfying, almost as if it were just a curious addendum to the story. The approach can certainly be defended as a mirror of reality, I suppose: an investigation stalls until new evidence is found, and then everything happens at once.

With these criticisms stated, it probably sounds like the book has little to recommend it. That is not true. Taken on its own merits, Love in Amsterdam provides an unassuming, psychologically observant, and generally rewarding reading experience, and it serves to introduce Dutch detective Pieter Van der Valk to the world, which is ample cause for celebration and a reason to (re)visit his literary origins. It is also heartening to know that Nicolas Freeling – who, it is reported, began this book while in jail for theft of food as a hotel restaurant cook – would improve on the formula, expand his ambitions, and make Inspector Van der Valk the center of his stories.

Tracy over at Bitter Tea and Mystery reviewed Love (or, as published in the U.S., Death) in Amsterdam last year. I hope she and others continue to explore the Van der Valk series, as I look forward to reading each title again after nearly two decades since my initial visit.

We start with the good (and in The Case of the Abominable Snowman, first published in 1941, the good is very good): the beginning and ending moments of this Nigel Strangeways story are striking and memorable. The American title The Corpse in the Snowman gives away the revelation of the first chapter, where two children watch from a bedroom window as melting snow uncovers a very human face under their seasonal sculpture. But it is the apparent suicide of a troubled woman upon which this snowbound manor house mystery revolves. In addition to the discovery of the body of poor Elizabeth Restorick in her bedroom, early eerie clues include a cat whose behavior goes haywire and a potentially supernatural appearance by the victim at the time of her death.

The ending, where Strangeways sets a trap for the killer and gets more of a reaction than he hoped for, is exciting and well staged by author Nicholas Blake. And the explanation offered that puts all of the collected puzzle pieces in place is both novel and rather unbelievable, even for the generally permissive world of detective fiction; I discuss these aspects a little later in the review. While the book begins and ends strongly, I found myself a little listless as author and investigator lay out the groundwork and do the heavy lifting.

While Blake shapes and complicates his plot with his customary inventiveness and attention to detail, there is something that keeps me at a distance from the characters and, ultimately, from the thrill of the chase itself. Snowman's middle section, with its theories and interviews and evidence gathering, is technically successful, but I found it difficult to focus on and engage with it all. The group of suspects should be engaging, and each character has enough definition to fill his or her assigned role in the larger drama. All the same, there's an overriding feeling of chess-play at work, with figures moved around on the board (or biding their time on their square) simply for the game's sake, so it is difficult at times to feel invested in the story of people touched by tragedy.

This criticism may have its roots in Blake's handling of Elizabeth Restorick, the victim at the center of the story. The reader never really becomes acquainted with her as a personality, yet she makes an unforgettable introduction as a corpse, hanging from a beam, her body naked and her face painted. Then we learn (through Nigel) of her troubled adolescence and adult addictions, and she becomes the impetus for future murderous acts. All this should inspire an exemplary drama on the page that has the fatalistic propulsion of Macbeth, but the mystery stays academic and somewhat abstract. I'm also setting the standard high simply because Blake, the pen name for poet Cecil Day-Lewis, has delivered several excellent crime stories with strong characterization and engrossing puzzle plotting, including Thou Shell of Death (1936) and The Beast Must Die (1938).

By the time Strangeways arrives at the climax leading to his extraordinary solution, however, all torpor has been shaken off. And the author's tying up of all of his threads -- with more than a little hypothesizing about motives and mechanics of the characters by his detective -- lands another rather extreme effect: it is an innovative and bold solution that pushes the bounds of accepted reality for the reader.

I say this because at least two elements require a faith (or suspension of disbelief) that a certain character would act almost counterintuitively to what a typical person would do under similar circumstances. To analyze either predicament here would require spoilers, and the enjoyable surprise in the revelations for new readers is too delicate to destroy. And in vaudeville, there is a delightful maxim/warning for its audience: "You buy the premise, you buy the bit." If you can believe two characters in this story would choose an extreme road of action over a far more practical pathway to see justice done, then The Case of the Abominable Snowman provides one of the most unusual and original resolutions in all of Golden Age Detection fiction.

One last detail: this is another example of a once-contemporary but now-historical crime novel that incorporates drug use and abuse by a character into the plot, and it paints the same curious, almost quaint, picture of the subject that modern readers often find in work from that era. Although talk of sidewalk "dope-peddlers" and "marijuana cigarettes" that "create erotic hallucinations" seems amusing today, I don't mean to minimize the power of drugs -- just look at our modern overreliance on prescription pills -- or the ravages of addiction.